Computer Science

Problem and Target Audience

Physical inactivity among young people has reached a critical level. According to the CDC, only 24% of adults aged 18-44 meet both aerobic and muscle-strengthening physical activity guidelines, and obesity prevalence among all adults sits at 40.3%, a figure that reflects decades of declining baseline activity. For teens and young adults specifically, the transition out of structured school athletics is a well-documented drop-off point: without mandatory PE, team sports, or regimented schedules, exercise becomes entirely self-directed, and most young people lack the habit infrastructure to sustain it independently.

The primary audience for this application is teens and young adults between the ages of 13 and 22 who are either beginning their fitness journey or struggling to maintain consistency with exercise. Specifically, the app targets users who are consistently active on social platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat, who are used to short, visual content, and who are more influenced by peers. A review published in PLOS One in which over 38,000 adolescents and young adults across 31 countries were examined, found that the main barriers to physical activity among high school and university students were lack of time, lack of motivation, and lack of accessible places, along with psychological and cognitive barriers such as a lack of self-discipline identified in nearly all regions studied. Lack of knowledge was also found as a barrier among university students, alongside lack of self-motivation, which were cited as major hindrances to any form of physical activity among college students (Márcia Ferreira Silva et. al., 2022).

Minimum Viable Product

Daily Exercise Challenge Delivery: Each day, a single exercise is pulled from a cloud-hosted Firestore database and pushed to all users simultaneously at 12:00 EST via a push notification. The exercise content is researched and stored internally in Firebase, so there's no reliance on a third-party exercise API. Users don't need to provide anything for this feature to work

Streak and Fitness Levels: With users confirming whether they completed an exercise, a daily streak can be implemented, and, with that, fitness levels can be tracked. Rather than a single universal exercise, the app could offer tiered versions of the daily challenge (beginner/intermediate/advanced). This makes the app more inclusive without changing the core "everyone does the same thing" social dynamic.

Photo/Video Proof and Community Feed: One way to make users more accountable is to require a media upload, where users record or upload a short clip of themselves doing the exercise, which is posted to a shared feed. This transforms the app from a personal tracker into a true social accountability platform, which is where the core motivation loop really kicks in.

Process

The process began with an extensive brainstorming session where a wide range of app ideas were proposed. The list was then narrowed down to two or three options, each evaluated for feasibility and how much it differentiated itself from existing products. This included an analysis of competitors and how saturated the space already was across apps and websites. Once a fitness app was selected as the direction, the focus shifted to understanding the problem at a deeper level.

Research was conducted on two fronts, drawing from firsthand experience with existing fitness apps to identify gaps, and consulting user reviews and academic studies on fitness habits across adolescent and adult populations. A consistent finding was that motivation and accountability were the leading reasons people abandoned exercise routines. This became the central problem the app was designed to address.

Design

The solution drew inspiration from BeReal, which is a social platform that prompts users to share an authentic moment in real time. Applied to fitness, the concept required users to complete an exercise and upload proof before any additional features were unlocked. That submission would then update both a community feed and a leaderboard, building a sense of accountability and friendly competition among users.

Implementation (MVP)

Given the constraints of the project timeline, the scope was limited to a realistic Minimum Viable Product. The initial build prioritized a sign-up and profile page, a curated list of beginner-friendly exercises sourced through research, and a photo upload page for submitting workout proof. Additional features, including the leaderboard, a leveling system, and the full community feed, were designated for later development phases.

Testing

Testing was conducted across eleven areas to ensure the app performed reliably across a range of situations and devices. Usability and interface testing confirmed the app was straightforward to navigate and consistent throughout. Functionality and compatibility testing verified that all features worked correctly across different devices, screen sizes, and operating systems. Performance and services testing examined behavior under conditions such as poor network coverage, low battery, and limited memory. Interruption and operational testing ensured the app recovered properly from unexpected disruptions and potential data loss scenarios. Installation testing confirmed the app deployed and removed cleanly across devices, and security testing verified that user data was handled safely and responsibly.

GitHub

Link to our GitHub

Demo

Apps For Good Poster